Scaling Chests and Energy costs for 'small' levels.
Wed, 10/13/2010 - 12:55
Currently it seems like drops in chests are based upon their depth, but allow for all items that can be dropped at all earlier depths as well.
With heat and coins you seem to get an amount appropriate to the depth.
Health max seems to allow for the 3-packs at a certain threshold.
However this seems problematic for other items. I'm guessing that the chests get a 0-to-X seed for the drop and as a result at advanced depths one tends to get colored shards the vast majority of the time. Perhaps I'm just working with a small sample size, however (Likely around a thousand chests at 20+ depth).
This seems a little less than ideal, particularly at the super depths. If it is seed-based and running a 0-to-X, might I suggest a X-Y to X seed instead? Or adding (visibly) different tiers of chests?
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The energy costs for small levels, like intermediary ones, seem a bit disproportionate to their reward. Perhaps half?
Perhaps unintended, but energy is charged to an individual when they join the party lobby. Maybe this could be made so that it is only charged when they actually enter the first level?
Wed, 10/13/2010 - 18:04
#2
I put the same suggestion
I put the same suggestion about lobby energy in after deciding to go back and change my equipment. 10 energy for a lobby feels a bit extortion-y.
Wed, 10/13/2010 - 19:03
#3
Yes please!
Oh yes please to booby trapped treasure levels! We are all getting terribly complacent, so it's sure to be a lot of Fun! I also think some parts of the treasure level should be harder to access instead of such a cakewalk.
I liked the crystal monsters on Final Fantasy. Here you are all ready to save your game, and the save crystal turns into a spider - how awesome would it be if when you smacked a crystal a monster jumped out :D
Wed, 10/13/2010 - 19:13
#4
We should still be able to
We should still be able to change our equipment in a party lobby. It's a lobby.
Thu, 10/14/2010 - 10:30
#5
Vials are -too- plentiful.
After speaking with a few others in-game, it seems that vials are actually the most annoying thing to receive in chests... frequently because they simply sit there unwanted. Particularly at advanced depths.
Thu, 10/14/2010 - 11:10
#6
We should still be able to
We should still be able to change our equipment in a party lobby. It's a lobby.
That should be possible for you. It won't be possible as soon as you enter the first level though.
Thu, 10/14/2010 - 11:13
#7
After speaking with a few
After speaking with a few others in-game, it seems that vials are actually the most annoying thing to receive in chests... frequently because they simply sit there unwanted. Particularly at advanced depths.
Is that because players aren't using them at all? Or because they pop up too fast to use?
And if they're not being used, is that because the effects are unknown for some of them? Or because they're not effective enough?
Thu, 10/14/2010 - 11:55
#8
vials
It seems like a little bit of both- for me at least. It's kind of that ever present RPG hoarding problem- you want to save your vials for when you need them, and prioritize the good ones, but if you don't use them at the right frequency you have to leave behind vials (that could have been treasure). And the frequency changes, too. Some levels have almost no treasure chests, and you feel inclined to hoard the bottles for a boss or tough encounter, and other levels (like treasure levels) have too many chests and not enough enemies to use the vials on.
Maybe there should be a few types of chests- some that are like the ones we have now, some that guarantee items, some that guarantee vials, so you can tailor the drops to suit the level.
Thu, 10/14/2010 - 12:07
#9
End Chests
A -slightly- separate issue is that many chests come at the end of a level/area. If that is the end of your trip it means that vials/healthmax are useless.
Thu, 10/14/2010 - 17:14
#10
Huh, I thought we couldn't
Huh, I thought we couldn't change in lobbies. Has that been changed or was I confused? :P
I think the new 3-of-anything limit on pickups will actually encourage me to use vials more, since I'm much less inclined to hoard them. But yeah, no-one cares about vials, and getting them in chests is just a let-down. They simply don't seem to be useful enough. I haven't even noticed the difference between normal vials and so-called super vials.
Vials are only handy when you're in over your head against a small number of very powerful enemies: gremlins, the turtle, jellies that combine, or Van. Against a large number of weaker enemies they don't help at all, because you simply don't need to slow down or poison a single enemy that you can kill with two hits. The problem is that the game constantly pits you against armies of wolvers and you hardly ever have to face a single mega-robo-wolver. Even the citadel just throws waves of skellies at you.
I suggest two solutions:
1. More bosses. More more more. I love bosses. Everyone loves bosses.
2. Vials that have a noticably larger area of effect, so they're useful against hordes. I would like to see another type of vial that explodes the same way vaporizer bombs do, leaving a good-sized cloud that affects anything that touches it for a few seconds. Put them in chests. Maybe only let us carry one of each at a time, if they're really powerful.
Thu, 10/14/2010 - 21:28
#11
Kharnor--We couldn't change
Kharnor--We couldn't change in lobby's before. I tried it earlier and we can now! Rejoice :D
I like the new 3 limit as well. I was a pretty bad hoarder of everything but health vials, those I actually used.
I've used the vials quite a bit, and the only one that did any visible damage was the burning one. I need to try chucking a poison one into a group of gremlins to see if that stops there healing. If so, I'm always gonna keep a stack of those :P
Vials are a little too conditional to be of much use when damage is a quicker and more viable alternative. They also seem to focus on dealing conditions, which I'm not entirely sold on:
Stun: I know my viewpoint is slanted as a player but i notice a huge difference when I am stunned (can't move hardly at all, leading to perma-stun status when against enemies who can stun), and hardly any difference when used on enemies. We had two people spamming haze bombs once and they really didn't seem to do much. Could just be perception since it is more noticable when it is happing to you, but I swear gremlins still flew all the way across the screen and hit me before I could react. Just like they always do.
Curse: enemy takes damage when they attack--most enemies attack fairly slow. I've only seen wolvers get one hit of damage while the curse was in effect. Low damage.
Freeze: useful for tagging a group of enemies and fleeing. Fighting the enemies? If you hit them it decreases the duration of the effect (breaking the ice) . This is really puzzling on my cryonic gun. Two shots, if the first shot freezes, second shot will break the ice freeing them. Useful! (I actually do like this gun because it does act as an ineterupt if it freezes, and if it is the second shot that freezes I have enough time to reposition and partially charge a full blast of doom.
Poison: Very few enemies heal, so this is highly conditional. Checking the wiki apparently poison also decreases attack power? I did not know about that, but if true, then this has some uses I can see. Fired Devilites are responsible for most of my party deaths lately :P Decreasing the sting of their flaming trident of fury would be nice.
Sleep: Haven't used it that much, but I did get sleep'd once and it didn't break after me taking multiple hits, so this is more useful than freeze :)
Shock: I like this one :) If I have the presence of mind I will chuck this at a group, and it seems to matter. Checking the wiki I can see why, there is an effect I didn't know shock did: "A unique characteristic of Shock is that, if another player or monster also affected by Shock is nearby, a bolt of electricity will leap between the two. This bolt will damage anything caught between." So shocking a big group should cause several bolts. Nice. The more obvious effect is interupting attacks periodically, but this has the same problem Curse has. Bonus on this one? This will interupt movement too, lining them up for some hurt.
Fire: I like this one too and regularly use this vial. Damage over time is fun. I don't use it in parties though since I'm likely to set fellow melee party members on fire due to the communicability?
So far I haven't seen conditions controlling a battle enough for them to be more useful than just using your weapon full time.
Thu, 10/14/2010 - 21:46
#12
Now that we can only hold 3
Now that we can only hold 3 of any game item at a time, I do think the drop rate is a bit high on vials.
I love using the fire vials on skellies. They die more quickly from a regular fire vial than from any of the swords and guns I've tried on them.
I haven't seen great results from any of the other vials, though it seems like each one will do a small amount of unannounced damage when it hits something, which is ok if I'm looking for something to throw. I did manage to poison one of the hammer gremlin dudes today. It wore off, and then he healed.
Fri, 10/15/2010 - 14:44
#13
Re: Vials
It's a combination of all the things Poseidon said, I think. I forget to use them, so they sit around taking up space, and I have to micromanage my inventory to clear them out if I want to pick up something else.
I also don't use them because, while they seem to hit pretty hard and have unlimited range, I don't know how effective they are. I can't see the initial damage or the subsequent damage from fire/curses, so I don't know how they stack up against my weapons. The status effects are decent on enemies, but not so good I wouldn't rather just spend the time making them dead so they can't hurt me.
When I buy access to a treasure room, vials are definitely the most disappointing thing to have spent $0.01125 on.
Fri, 10/15/2010 - 22:50
#14
The only vials I have shown
The only vials I have shown much interest in are the health and fire ones, and even with the fire ones it's usually only when I'm in a bind.
I don't yet recognize which colors have which effect, and I don't have a sense for how useful they are against different enemies. So, now if I come to aca situation where I consider using a vial I have to go hover over them to figure out which are which, then try to determine if any of these effects are useful. The stun vial seems to do almost nothing. And why would I want to stun an enemy anyhow? Throwing a vial at them is equally as difficult as shooting them, and unless the effect was huge, I can't see taking the time to stun them rather than just attack.
I agree that more bosses would likely make me use more vials, especially if the effects were more noticeable on them. Stunning a big boss and letting me take a few free hits at them would be valuable. Stunning a lone lichen, or a single lichen out of a mob would be worthless. A lone lichen I can take out easily anyway. With a mob, even if it was really really effective on one lichen I'd still have to run around to avoid getting hit by the rest of the mob so I wouldn't be able to take advantage.
The cure vial also seems worthless to me. I've only been stunned and poisoned so far, but the poison went away pretty quickly, and the stun I was too busy trying to get away. I don't really see a time when I would want to spend the time to use a cure vial instead of run away. If cure vials were used instantly without interrupting your movement, I could see using them.
Attack vials would be nice if you could either throw them or use them instantly to create a small cloud where you are standing (maybe by double tapping the key to use them?).
Sat, 10/16/2010 - 16:48
#15
I'm with grohac, I find the
I'm with grohac, I find the vials to be a nice idea but poor in practice. And an emphatic YES to the remedy being extra-useless. Died I don't know how many times today because I tried to remedy out of stun or poison and just ended up getting pounded instead. As I mentioned in another thread, if you could activate health vials and remedies on the go, they would be incredibly useful. As it stands, I only really use fire and health.
Sun, 10/17/2010 - 14:38
#16
I agree
I think that as you reach depper levels the rewards should get greater and greater, quaility over quantity per say. Because based on what people have said before, there's no point in reaching the core if all I get down there are shards and vials.
I was quite amused when "all dis fine loot" at the core was... a handful of shards and vials :P
I'd also like to see another, rarer type of chest; one that is guaranteed not to be a 1-star material, vial or capsule. Could be used for end-of-super-hard-level rewards. I really don't need vials after I've already killed everything. :P
You could put a few of them in treasure levels, and heavily boobie trap the room! :D :D :D (It says in the level description that some treasure levels are boobie trapped, but we haven't seen that yet and people are getting complacent :P)